


I'm still here love as I've always been before

by GraceEliz



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Age Regression/De-Aging, Angst, Brotherly Love, Family, Fluff, Fox is a good dad, Gen, Hardcase Lives (Star Wars), Jocasta Nu is a Badass, Kamino sucked, Mentions of Slavery, Parent-Child Relationship, Young Anakin Skywalker, it's gonna be fine i swear down, lightsaber-rifle grandma, neurodivergent clones, no beta we die like my muse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:35:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28463940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GraceEliz/pseuds/GraceEliz
Summary: ’67 wakes up under sky which is a pale blue like his eyes, entirely unlike the dark or glowing skies of Kamino.“Hello?” he asks into the air. There is no response, not even the hum he’s accustomed to from training rooms. Slowly, he pulls himself upright. He doesn’t think he was due for recommissioning, but then again, they usually don’t, it always happens suddenly. But this doesn’t look like Kamino. It’s dry, rocky and sandy. He rubs with his bare hands at the dirt. “Ip? Keeli? Seven?”A Little enters his sight. A nat-born, must be, all pale and bright blue eyes.
Relationships: CC-1010 | Fox & Anakin Skywalker, CC-1010 | Fox & CT-7567 | Rex, CC-2224 | Cody & CT-7567 | Rex, CT-21-0408 | CT-1409 | Echo & CT-27-5555 | ARC-5555 | Fives & CT-7567 | Rex, CT-7567 | Rex & Anakin Skywalker, Riyo Chuchi/CC-1010 | Fox
Comments: 122
Kudos: 283
Collections: New SW Canon Server Works





	1. return

**Author's Note:**

> title from Fair by The Amazing Devil. Happy New Year, loves. This is for Ace, who provides me with stuff and then very patiently and enthusiastically waits for me to write it.

’67 wakes up under sky which is a pale blue like his eyes, entirely unlike the dark or glowing skies of Kamino.

“Hello?” he asks into the air. There is no response, not even the hum he’s accustomed to from training rooms. Slowly, he pulls himself upright. He doesn’t think he was due for recommissioning, but then again, they usually don’t, it always happens suddenly. But this doesn’t look like Kamino. It’s dry, rocky and sandy. He rubs with his bare hands at the dirt. “Ip? Keeli? Seven?”

A Little enters his sight. A nat-born, must be, all pale and bright blue eyes, why is there a nat-born Little? What the – he glances almost guiltily around in case an Alpha or a CC is around, not that they’d hear him swearing anyway – Storms is happening? “Where are we? Who are you?” The Little’s voice is like none he’s ever heard before, he doesn’t even know how to begin describing it – soft? Not a scary voice, but then, Prime’s voice isn’t scary either, and everyone knows how dangerous he is.

“’m Rex,” he says, then winces. They’re not meant to start with their names, it’s right there in chapter one of the regs, even Littles know this. “CT-7567.”

The boy almost relaxes, still wary and well out of what would be striking range for a normal person, eyeing him up dubiously. Rex doesn’t feel in the mood to offer up a more realistic distance for the kid to put between them, not when he takes a half-step nearer before he speaks. “You’re a slave too?”

“I’m a soldier,” he corrects smartly. But yes. Sort of, yes, but also, no.

The boy hums, blue eyes wide. He must be four or five, but nat-borns age slower so he’s... Three? No, that’s not right. Maybe he’s older and looks like a Little? “My name is Anakin.”

“Okay.” Rex stands up. He would really, really appreciate a CC right now. He’d even take an Alpha and their tough love. He wants Cody. He wants his batch. He wants to know what’s happening. “We need to find my batchers and hope the CCs are around.”

Anakin looks up at him with those huge unnatural eyes. “Batcher? What’s a CC, are they slaves too?”

This is going to be a long walk, huh. “My brothers.”

“I have a brother too,” says Anakin, “and two sisters.”

Hesitantly, because nobody even Fox had ever told him what to do if he woke up on…a different planet? Yeah, dry dusty and dead, a different planet he has no idea to survive, for sure. Nobody has briefed him on this, or on interacting with nat-born Littles. A rapid sense-check yields up nothing wrong with him physically. There is no pain, so sense of his body being in the wrong place. His blacks even feel like his, even though part of him insists that he isn’t in the right clothes. Maybe they’re Ip’s, wouldn’t be the first time.

“What are your brothers called?”

He blinks. “I don’t think I’m allowed to tell you that.”

The kid frowns a bit, but lets the matter drop, considering, his cheek sucked into his mouth. “Yeah, my Aunts are like that.” After another minute, in which they’ve managed to get out of the little rock-hollow they woke up in, he continues, “your names are a secret.”

“Yeah,” he answers a bit absently. There is nothing, just a seemingly endless expanse of grass. Green, and yellow, and those gold colours, things he’s only seen in simulations.

Rex decides he prefers blue.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” breathes Anakin, reaching down to pick up a rock. He flinches when Rex catches his hand gently but firmly, eyes wide in new fear.

Right, the kid wouldn’t be able to see him move, what with Rex on command track training prep, and the whole genetically modified stuff. “Sorry. Don’t touch anything. It might be harmful.”

Anakin does not try to touch any more grassy rocks.

They’ve been trudging for hours now. There’s no water, just loads of this endless rock and green plants, and apparently neither of them have seen plants before because Anakin is awed like a Little meeting the CCs. Rex doesn’t particularly want to admit he’s freaking out but there’s no ocean and no Kamino at all and yes he is freaking out. He’s got his dcs, though they’re not his, and the oversized plates he left behind – his blacks are fitted but the plates were too big and he’s afraid he is terrified that there’s an Alpha or one of First Batch who should be here too and if it is one of First Batch they must be dead and they can’t be dead what could take them down Cody is vicious and Wolffe is violent and Bly is clever and Fox is sly and Ponds is fast and if there’s something here that could take one of First Batch he wants the fuck away from it.

But there’s the Little. Anakin is apparently seven years old.

This is confusing. Rex is technically seven. He is at least twice Anakin’s height and he is certain easily three times his strength.

Anakin is twitchy. He keeps his hand on his hip. Rex doesn’t know why, and that’s making him twitchy.

The land continues to be green.

Anakin seems to know where they should be going, and since Rex doesn’t have any better ideas or “inner sense”, he lets the Little direct them. They’ve walked so long Anakin has grown tired enough to stagger, so he stops. “Do you want me to piggyback you?”

“Can you?”

He shrugs. “Sure. You’re lighter than my batchers, I had to carry Ip three miles for training last week.” Without thinking too hard about it, he crouches with his back to the nat-born kid. “Hop on.”

Cautiously, the kid does, wrapping his legs about his waist and arms over his shoulders. “Thank you.”

Rex grunts. The grass seems longer now, darker green. There is nothing at all within eye-range. “Are you sure you’re leading us right?”

“Something is pulling me, like a string in my stomach.”

“Okay.”

In front of them, distantly, is a starship like the ones in the sims, surrounded by white figures. It’s a Venator class, Rex is pretty sure, one which he thinks is being used as a home-base for whoever it is.

The thing is: the War hasn’t started yet. Sure, all the older classes are ready for immediate deployment, but Rex is one of the first CT lines, and they’re definitely not ready. CCs are amazing but even they’re still a bit average, still only really good instead of the ‘excellent’ they’re all meant to aspire to, on threat of decommission. The thing is, something isn’t adding up about this experience at all, and he can’t quite lay his thoughts into an order that can make it sensical.

There’s a flurry of activity, and some of the white figures break off towards him and Anakin. They’ve been noticed.

Anakin notices them five minutes later, tapping nervously on Rex’s chest. “Hey, they’re running towards us.”

“Yeah.”

He clings a little tighter around Rex’s shoulder. “They’re running really fast.”

“Yeah,” he agrees, straining his eyes to see if he recognises them. Cody, or Six, or Fox or Bly, please, he wants an older brother, he wants someone who can give him a sitrep, just wants to not be alone anymore. None of them are ever alone like this in training, they’re not designed to operate alone.

The white brothers become one orange and three blue decorated brothers, fully kitted up and – their armour is dented and marked and the paint is old. What is happening? The only thing that makes sense is that the War is started, but that is an impossibility.

“Rex!”

He frowns, stills. Anakin doesn’t attempt to get down, and he gives no indication that he should do anything else.

The one in gold skids to a stop, pops his helmet frantically, eyes wide, and a scar twisting down the left one. “Rex, it’s Cody!”

No. Cody is a growth cycle ahead but he’s not actually fully grown yet like this. The CCs are still Prime’s height, not like this, grown and muscled and scarred and sad.

“Can you tell us what happened, Rex?” he asks gently.

Slowly, Rex lets Anakin down to the floor, drawing him to stand in front of him, eyeing up Cody. And that is Cody, he knows it, he knows Cody like he knows Ip and Seven. “I woke up in a hollow in the rocks over there,” he points, “a walk of – uh – four and a half hours or so? Anakin was there too. We don’t know anything else. There’s a set of full-size plates, and a bucket with the jaig-eyes on it. In blue.”

The two blues who haven’t removed their buckets glance at each other. One has a handprint in blue paint, and the other has a stripe ending in an arc on his helmet. The third blue has popped his bucket to reveal buzzed-short hair, a tattoo reading ‘the only good droid is a dead one’, and sharper features than usual. Just enough for a brother to notice. Not enough for a nat-born; Anakin probably can’t really tell. “I need to have you in the medbay for checks.”

Anakin retreats against Rex with burst of worry, twisting his fingers into his blacks. “Are you going to take us back?”

The medic’s eyes narrow, but he remains soft and solid, just as a brother should be. “Back?”

Anakin shifts uncertainly, flicking his eyes between the four brothers then up to Rex before answering. “Back to Watto,” he whispers.

The brothers don’t stiffen up or tense or snarl or growl, or any of that which Rex is half-expecting. They just don’t react, at all. “No,” says the medic in blue as if Anakin had asked whether the sun ever shines on Kamino. “You’re coming home with us which is where you belong, Anakin Skywalker, with all the stars in the galaxy at your fingertips. My name is Kix, and I am your medic.”

“Nice to meet you,” breathes Anakin, all soft-awe and cautious interest. “Will you take my chip out?”

“Where is it?”

“Hip.” Well, thinks Rex, that would explain why he kept rubbing at his hip on the walk here; putting chips into people is barbaric and simply vile. It makes him a bit nauseous.

“When we get back I will,” he promises, holds up his pinkie finger which Anakin hooks his own into. “I can’t do hip operations in these conditions.”

Anakin’s eyes open wider than Rex thought a child’s eyes could, blue like the skies above. “Thank you, Kix,” he breathes, and Kix just grins and winks and stands up, holding his bucket one-handed.

“Cody?”

“Yeah, Rex?”

He hesitates, a bit scared to ask, but he’s tired and lonely and in need of a face he truly knows. “I want Ip and Seven and Keeli.”

Cody is quiet for a moment, a blank flash of something crossing his face. “I’ll see what I can do,” he finally tells him, and rests his hand heavy on Rex’s head just like he used to, when they were still Littles. “We’ll go see Fox first.”

“Fox is here?” he gasps, craning his neck towards the distant ship as though he’ll be able to see him from this distance.

“No, he’s on Coruscant. He’s a very high position,” says his older brother with a grin at his enthusiasm. He takes a step away, shifting into Commander-mode. “Are we ready to move out, boys? Echo, Fives, make sure Rex is alright. Kix, carry Anakin. I’m going ahead to settle the General’s nerves.”

“General?” whispers Anakin in wonder, looking to Rex. He shrugs- of course there is a General, but he has no idea who it would be. “Generals are in charge of soldiers?”

Does Anakin not know what a General is? That is completely mind-blowing to Rex – he’s been raised a soldier. He looks down at the Little in curiosity, wondering how different their lifestyles are. “Yeah. He’s a great man, General Kenobi. He loves you a great deal, Anakin; he will be greatly relieved to hear you’re unharmed. He’s fretted himself sick ever since you disappeared two days ago,” Kix says with a frown quickly shaken away in favour of a reassuring grin. “Hop up.”

Cody jogs back towards the ship, loping easily along in that gait that they all learn as Littles, the one they can keep up for hours upon hours that eats up the miles. Once Anakin is comfortable, Kix replaces his bucket and begins marching after Cody, steady and quicker than Rex could, with his cadet-legs. The two other blues turn to him, pop their buckets and grin. The one with the arc-pattern has a little 5 tattooed on his temple, and a little beard. It’s him who speaks first. “Are you alright walking? We can carry you if you want. I’m Fives, and this is Echo.”

He thinks for a minute, considering the ache in his back from carrying Anakin and the fact that despite his anxiety telling him otherwise these are his brothers, his brothers even if he doesn’t recognise them. They won’t hurt him, and he can afford to let himself rest. He just wants to sleep for a week. “Please.”

Echo crouches slightly. “Hop on, Rex,” he says gently, “you won’t be too much for us. We both made ARC recently.” He doesn’t hesitate before marching off towards the ship, Kix a rapid blue-white blur and Cody already a solid chunk of the way there.

“That’s so cool,” Rex breathes, leaning back a bit to get a good look at Fives who is traipsing beside them, bouncing his right hand just like Ip does. His Kama swishes as he walks, just how Rex always thought they would. “Do you know First Batch?”

They look at each other, muted awe and a sort of hidden amusement he knows is the sort only batchers can have. “Not like you do. Neither of us have ever met anyone from First Batch but Commander Cody, I think,” Echo says.

Rex sighs. “Bly is the fun one,” he advises, “he’s really clever. Fox is cool too, but Cody is my favourite.” He pauses a moment. “Don’t tell them I said that,” he warns and rests his head against Echo’s, “they’ll never shut up about it. Why do you talk like that?”

“Like what?” asks Echo curiously, tipping his head to show attentiveness, pressing their temples together. It feels good, the contact. Camaraderie.

“Like…not like us.”

They’re both quiet a minute. “You still have the Tipoca accent,” Echo slowly says, eventually, as if he is sounding out the words as he says them, “and we don’t anymore. We’re trying to make it easier for you but our accents are changed, a lot. It’s being on deployment. It changes how you talk, the words you use. The Command track have a Posh Voice they use in important meetings.”

Rex thinks about it. It does make sense, really, that voices and speech patterns would change. It’s a bit like how the Alphas use more mando’a than the younger brothers do, or how the CC classes use so many hand-signs to communicate, all those little non-verbal communications. The War is going, gone on for enough time he really doesn’t want to know.

And he is a Cadet again.

“Echo?”

“Yeah?”

“How much time have I lost?”

The ARC trooper tightens his hands around Rex’s legs. “A good handful of years, Rex. I’m sorry.”

Ip, he thinks, Ip and Seven and Cody and Fox, and they’re just different and moved along and he hasn’t got any of it. “What happened to me?”

“I don’t know,” admits Echo quietly, and neither of them say anything when the tears start, when he cried into Echo’s shoulder, tears shining on the blue-and-white pauldron.

When they reach the ship he’s cried out, drained and exhausted and bewildered by the colours all around him. He misses the consistent white and rain of Kamino, misses the warmth of his batchers and the steadiness and routine. Cody is waiting for them, helmet hooked on his kama-belt and arms crossed, a heavy frown weighing down his brows. Is that what Prime looked like, when he was younger? On that note, where is Prime? Kamino? Flitting around the galaxy? Hiding, forgotten, safe and secured finally?

“Hey, Rex,” Cody greets him tiredly. Echo lets him slide down, and he goes easily into Cody’s hold, tucking his head against his chest and everything feels wrong, incorrect. Dysphoric. “Come on, kid, Kix is waiting for you,” he says quietly, and Rex just lets himself be pulled along through the ship, too exhausted to truly process any of it.

“You don’t sound right,” he mumbles, longing just for the comfort of the familiar and not these harsher cut-off words which mix oddly melodically with drawn vowels.

Cody tightens his arm around his shoulders, but the comfort it should have is lacking, because his big brother isn’t meant to actually be this big. “Sorry, vod’ika,” he says, but there’s a solidity to his tone, a sense that he means it but won’t be changing circumstances because they can’t be changed.

Petulant, he thinks he’d rather just have someone he doesn’t know than this. Not this half-knowing and confusion and all the everything everywhere – this is not the white and grey and occasional blue of Kamino. This is headache-inducing.

He closes his eyes and hums and follows his brother, and longs to have one of his squad to hold his hand. Are they grown too, now? Is Keeli sharp-eyed and hard, and Ip as brutal as he used to be? Does Seven still try to convince Keeli that they’re basically interchangeable because they’re tube-twins? Where are they, if he’s here? And the rest of his batch-line, outside of his squad, where are they now?

“Rex!”

It’s Anakin, but he doesn’t open his eyes. Strong arms, Cody’s, lift him onto a bed, and then there are other hands on him and Kix’s soft voice telling him it’s okay to sleep.


	2. travel

A voice echoes in from outside of the medbay, the same voice he’s always known and been surrounded by, but with that unusual accent that all this regiment have, and using words he can’t quite parse. He heard captain in there, he is sure. The brother is asking permission to enter, but who is the Captain? Kix?

“Rex is in no state for visitors, Hardcase,” snaps Kix in that slightly strained attempt at Tipoca accent Rex noticed them using before, and he cautiously opens an eye. Is he the Captain, then? Rex, CT-7567, a Captain? There’s a brother with blue lines tracing down his head bouncing at the doorway, emitting enough nervous energy it isn’t a surprise Kix won’t let him in. Medbays are supposed to be soothing places.

“Who are you?”

Hardcase bounds over, draws himself up short before bouncing on the bed when Kix makes a loud noise in the back of his throat. “Hardcase, sir. I brought you something.”

“Not in my medbay,” Kix orders, pointing a scalpel threateningly in their direction, distracting him from trying to parse his emotions on being called sir. “Absolutely not whilst I extract this chip from Anakin’s hip. Now, you can sit with Rex, but one word from Coric –”

“Coric is the 212th head medic, he’s as scary as Kix,” Hardcase provides with a cheeky grin, flittering his fingers.

Kix speaks over the interruption, one hand on his hip, sharp face set in a frown. “I hear one word from Coric and you are both grounded.”

“Yessir,” they chorus, then Hardcase giggles. “I’m on best behaviour! Not every day the Captain is a Little.”

Rex isn’t entirely sure what he thinks about being referred to as a Little, but Hardcase seems genuinely very happy to see him – and he will be able to tell Rex why he’s the Captain. He knows Command Track means he’d be qualified, but being in charge to that degree was an emergency measure, right? But this is a whole new world. He doesn’t know anything anymore.

“CT nine-four-one-five!”

His eyes widen ridiculously wide as he freezes. At the door, panting, is another clone, whose blue face-tattoo is a swirl-filled Y-shape over his eye. It’s pretty, Rex thinks, but it must have hurt. “Ah, harchaak.”

“Trooper Hardcase, come over here right now,” he hisses, leaning in the door.

Kix raises his eyebrow, turning from his surgery preparations in the corner. Drowsy, Anakin tries to lean past to see, but is easily pushed flat again by the no-nonsense medic so the anaesthesia can work. After a few whispered words Rex can’t hear he turns back to face them, lips tight. “What has he done now, Dogma?”

Dogma purses his lips. “He knows.”

“I do know,” agrees Hardcase with a nod, leaning over towards Rex. “Hey, a hug before my vod’ika there thrashes me?”

He lets the hyperactive trooper give him an unexpectedly tender hug. “What’s harchaak mean?” he whispers.

With a wink, Hardcase whispers back a promise to tell him later on, and then he’s hurling himself with a screech at Dogma, who wrestles him to the floor, yelling incomprehensibly. They’re both physically kicked out of the medbay by a yellow medic who must be Coric, and their yelling attracts a medic from the bay opposite who shrieks something incomprehensible at them both, and then in a flurry of noise they’re gone.

“Never a dull moment with those two,” says Kix with a fond shake of his head.

“I liked them.”

The medic barks a laugh. “Of course you did. If you feel alright and General Kenobi allows it, you can bunk in with them tonight, I know Cody has meeting all night. Tup is a nice, soft sort of vod, and Dogma is good. Strict, but Hardcase needs him to be. Who else is in with them…Wooley may be in there, he hangs with them when the 501st and 212th are together.”

Rex frowns. “Two battalions?” Why two, together? Although it wouldn’t be unusual to work two together, really, they used to have classes thrown together to train them into adaptability.

“Anakin was General Kenobi’s student. He is a bit young to function entirely alone, especially with a Padawan of his own, but she isn’t here right now. Now,” says Kix seriously, “the Domino Twins brought back your armour.”

“My armour – that was mine?”

The medic softens, remembering or maybe realising that he truly knows absolutely nothing about whatever it is that’s happened to him. “Sorry, vod. Yes. They gave it to the General to have a look at.”

After a moment, he asks the question that’s been weighing him. “Is the General nice?”

Kix smiles at him. “He is a very good man, and he deserves far better than the hand his life has dealt him. Remember that. We all deserve better.” An orderly in scrubs pushes Anakin into the surgery, and Kix rolls his shoulders. “Get some sleep. This shouldn’t take too long.”

“Rise and shine, ya bunch of layabouts,” bellows someone down the bunks. Amidst the groans, Rex hears the distinctive clang of a thrown plate, probably a pauldron or shinplate, and a laugh of triumph with quickly becomes a yelp, followed by the thumps of bodies hitting the ground.

He sits up, watching Dogma shake his head and swing easily out of his bunk. Watching them move is fascinating, the easy strength, the flexibility of them. One day, he too will look like that, effortless power and confidence. When Tup leans down the top bunk, his hair in an unruly tangle of very tight curls, soft and silken, but tangled. Dogma sighs. “I’ll braid it back for you, but we’re gonna need more than the five minutes we have now, I’ll brush it over lunch break.”

“That’s okay,” agrees Tup, still raspy with sleep. His next words are in a language Rex has never heard, but it must be one they all others know because it’s Hardcase who answers. His legs appear over the edge of the top bunk, encased in his blacks, and Dogma swats at him before he gets kicked in the face. They must live like this, he realises, in these moments of almost careless brotherhood.

“What do we do now?”

They glance at each other. Wooley, who got up first and is already dressed, shrugs. “You could come ask the General before he goes to bed.”

“Ask him what?”

“Just, generally. What’s happening.”

He nods slowly. The General will know where Anakin is. And, also, even better, the General won’t sound wrong like his brothers do, because he won’t be expecting the Tipoca-accent. Is the General nice? Will he ignore Rex, or want to study him?

Would he send him back?

“C’mon Captain,” Dogma says quietly. “We’ll go drop you off with Cody for breakfast.”

He follows his brother out of the bunks, Hardcase sniggering away about something with great enthusiasm, enough so that Tup keeps asking him what he’s laughing about. At the end of the hall, Wooley heads right, and the blue squad members lead him off to the left. “Something smells nice,” he offers, and gets a noncommittal noise off Dogma.

“It’s pretty good,” Tup says, running a gentle hand over his head. Everything Tup does is so gentle, soft and kind like his hair, braided back in a perfect braid by Dogma.

At the entrance to the canteen is a gaggle of brothers, so tall and battle-worn, and among them, scarred eye crinkled up in a laugh, is his favourite older brother. “Cody!”

“Rex,” murmurs Cody. He offers a greeting to the others, one that sounds like mando’a, and it’s returned with affection before they go loping off down the hall, Dogma and Hardcase bickering again in that dialect he just can’t understand, the rest of the loitering blue going with them.

He stands and looks at his older brother a moment, taking in the cheek-crinkles and edges of his face. “You look tired,” Rex finally says, because he does – tired like First Batch used to when they were worked like Alphas, as though their child-bodies meant nothing in the face of their advancements. How advanced are they? Full grown, what can they do?

Cody’s face is tender-soft, and it looks unusual, such soft brown-gold eyes in his harsh face. “Let’s get you fed, vod’ika, and then you can see Anakin and General Kenobi, hm?”

“I don’t want to!”

Anakin’s voice rings out across the mess hall in childish distress, making Cody’s heart hurt where he’s in line with Rex. He catches the back of his little brother’s shirt with two fingers, easily holding him back from racing over. Cadets are so small, as small as Commander Tano. He keeps forgetting how small some beings can be, how fragile. “They need to learn each other,” he whispers, an attempt at comfort. His brother huffs, craning his neck to try see the Little and their General.

“No! No, I don’t want to! I want to stay with you, Obi-Wan! I don’t want to leave! I want to stay here,” the child, his General’s child, insists, voice filling with tears and anxiety.

Obi-Wan’s voice is nearly as exhausted as his boy’s, too low for them to hear from this distance.

“I just got here and you’re sending me away?”

He knows Rex is only waiting until Cody has filled his tray to rush over and get back to his commander-brother, the only thing about this whole situation that isn’t going completely against all Rex’s memories. “The shouting is good, Rex. It means trust, yeah?”

They’re almost back at the table now, and Anakin hasn’t had any further outbursts. Rex is anxious, bouncing on his toes. Cody keeps a weather eye on the soup in case he has to signal someone to sort it out. “Why is the General crying?”

“It’s because he’s happy.”

His little brother stares between them with his too-pale eyes. “But people don’t cry when they’re happy!”

Cody sighs, reminding himself to be patient, and that he needs to remember to keep calm so Rex can understand him. The Command Voice exists for a reason – it’s just that this particular situation is completely coming out of the blue. “Sometimes we do. When we’re very happy, like when I got you back.”

“Why is the General so happy, then,” he whispers as they sit. Anakin is curled into the Obi-Wan’s lap, fingers wrapped into his robes, listening as the gentle man with his sad, sad eyes whispers.

Cody smiles, passes his hand over Rex’s head in a move he’s picked up from his General, in a move he’s seen Fox pull on everyone from First Batch to nat-born children lost in the streets. “Because Anakin trusts him enough to shout, and that means a lot.”

“Yeah,” Rex concedes quietly, still looking a bit troubled. “I guess so.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so fox is DEFINITELY in the next one this time i promise okay


	3. coruscant

Riyo had insisted on coming with him to pick up Cody and Rex, justifying her presence by assuring him, quite accurately, that ‘Cody and the Generals aren’t going to be the only ones freaking out.’ He’s relieved she didn’t say _because you need me there_ , because that’s a level of unflattering truth he can’t handle right now. Two personal crises at a time and no more, thank you.

They’re stood shoulder-to-shoulder waiting on the landing platforms attached to the Temple for the General and Cody (and he assumes Skywalker and Rex) to disembark the Negotiator.

“Will he recognise you?” asks Riyo gently, peeking up at him under her lashes. Her shawl flutters in the low breeze and she steps closer to him so he acts as a windblock.

He hums, tapping his fingers over his helmet _one_ - _two_ - _three_ - _four_ where it hangs off his kama-belt. “Cody will of course, and Rex is plenty intuitive enough to work out who I am even if we hadn’t spoken yet. He commed me two days ago for a few minutes, at the end of a meeting, but we didn’t get to talk much,” he says quietly, frowning as the image of those pale eyes in a child’s face haunt him once more. He’s so used to the strong and smart Captain he’s seen grow into himself that the child on the holo had been almost sickeningly out of place.

“What’s the word you boys use for the younger ones? Shinies?”

“Shinies are new soldiers,” Fox informs her, grateful for this chance to distract himself a little. “The Littles are the children, and Rex is a Cadet, old enough to train properly but not ready for deployment.” Theoretically too young, but with the way the war is progressing and how young his newest Shinies are…

His favourite Senator smiles gently.

Cody comes out of the Negotiator first, rushing off the ramp before it’s even wholly down, leaving his docking crew shaking their heads behind him. “Thank Storms you’re here,” he says, and hurtles himself to slump into Fox’s arms like a Little, “it’s been horrible.”

“I bet,” he rumbles, and drops his vod’ika on the tarmac. Cody leaps back up to his feet without retalitating, rubbing his finger over the crease of his scar, betraying how tired he really is.

“Ahsoka will be pleased to see you, Senator Chuchi,” his brother says with a polite bow. “Thank you for coming to collect her.”

Riyo shakes her head, smiles so soft and gently, her small blue hand out-of-place in the extreme against Cody’s battle-marked vambrace. “She’s as good as a little sister, of course I would come,” she assures him. “How is she?”

“Not bad, but spooked out,” he provides, then winces as they hear the wail of a Little. “Anakin hasn’t slept much since we picked her up for…a few reasons, and he’s, uh, what’s the word. Fractious.”

Joys, thinks Fox wearily.

“Neither has Rex. He’s freaking out, still. It’s been a while. A few weeks.”

Fox almost snaps the grip of his dc in shock. “I’m sorry, a few weeks? You told me a few days!”

Cody backs up a step in the face of his unexpected anger, then turns as if to run back to the ramp, but it’s too late. There’s a Cadet heading towards them, blond and gangling. Rex. “Stars above,” breathes Fox. He’s so small, so slender and ungrown. It’s almost unnatural, now, to see a brother who isn’t fully grown yet; they never get anyone younger than the last growth-stage sent to Coruscant and he thought they were tiny.

“Fox!”

He braces his weight off his bad knee, catches Rex with ease. Like a child, Rex wraps his arms and legs around him, clinging and sobbing, his tears soaking into Fox’s neck where he’s burrowed his face.

“I was so scared and there was nobody there and I’ve never been away from the oceans and Cody isn’t telling me where my batch is and he won’t tell me where Ponds is and I want Seven and Ip and Keeli and I want to go back, I’m scared,” he babbles desperately, broken up by sobs and gasps. Fox glares at Cody when he realises what’s wrong with Rex’s voice, the way the words tumble from his mouth: he’s still speaking in Tipoca accent, still speaking like all the Cadets do before they get sent out and develop the speech patterns of their Battalion.

“You coward,” he hisses, in mando’a, appreciating cody’s flinch. Calling his little brother a hutuun is perhaps a bit harsh, but he feels justified. Curt and sharp in the manner of Upper Coruscanti – the only dialect he can think of that Rex is going to understand – hoisting Rex higher into his arms to free up his movement, he collects his orders. “Go collect Wolffe from the Temple, then come to Barracks. Riyo, stay with Ahsoka. I will have your boys billeted in their usual quarters below the Temple. Rex will be staying with me.”

Just let anyone try steal his little brother away from him. He’s in half a mind just to have Cody relieved until this is sorted, keep his brothers either in Guard Barracks or the Temple where they’d be safe.”

Cody sighs. “Yes, Fox.” He has the grace to look ashamed, and Fox feels his withered heart easing in his chest. His brothers are home and that’s what matters.

Big blue eyes are narrowed at him in something almost approaching mistrust, Rex leaning away just slightly into the immovable steel of his arms. “Fox?”

“Yes?”

“You don’t sound right.”

He hesitates, brain whirring to decide how much to share, trying to decide how much Rex already knows. “It’s because I’ve lived here too long.”

Rex relaxes, just a little, enough to take the strain out of holding him up. “I couldn’t understand the others. Even Cody, at first.”

Three weeks, three entire weeks where nobody would have sounded right, where he wouldn’t have been able to understand a thing at first, where his every expectation would just have been wrong. “Oh, Rex,” he sighs, and holds the kid tighter. “It’s going to be okay.”

Fox turns to leave, seething at the thought that he has to break it to Rex that his batch is gone. Why wouldn’t Cody do it? Rex whimpers, clutching at his blacks. “Wait, Fox. We have to wait for Anakin and General too.”

Well, that’s good, right? He turns around, shifting Rex to his good hip so the kid can lean their temples together and wait for Cody, the General and Anakin Skywalker. The intermittent wails and sobs are louder now, making him tense his jaw against the impulse to march in and retrieve the child. He can see his men on the platform are also uncomfortable, tense in the manner that shows they’re absolutely ready to form up and extract the kid.

“No, I won’t leave! I want to stay with you!”

His men relax ever so slightly. They’ve been witness to enough domestics now to know when a situation requires intervention. Riyo places her hand on his elbow before jogging to meet Padawan Tano on the ramp; Rex twists his head down to look after her.

The General comes down to the deck, visibly exhaling in relief when he sees Rex held safe in his arms. “You’ll be with Rex and Fox. You like Rex,” he assures loud enough for them to hear, and Fox nearly laughs at how haggard the General sounds. “Fox is great. I must go talk to the Council, and the Jedi – mastery over oneself, little one.”

Anakin huffs, clinging to Kenobi much how Rex is clinging to him. “I don’t want to be master of myself, I want to come with you! And be with Rex! And Cody!”

Fox meets Cody’s eyes, realising that they are about to have tantrums, and that Cody has never dealt with nat-born kids before – it explains the echaustion. Which is, he supposes, why he is here. Ahsoka and Riyo have slumped onto the ground a few feet away, leaning into each other. They’ll be fine. “Anakin can come with us, whilst Cody collects Wolffe and the General goes to the Temple,” he soothes in the voice he uses when he’s working. Rex tucks his head into his neck, watching. “Anakin, would you come with us? We’re going to the den.”

Kenobi scowls over Anakin’s head, who is watching the changing shift in dubious curiosity. “I want him nowhere near the Chancellor.”

“No problem,” responds Fox seriously. “I would never willingly allow a child in that man’s presence.”

Anakin twists on Kenobi’s hip, leaning towards Fox with serious blue eyes. “I'll come with you if you carry me."

Rex sets his feet on the floor when gently encouraged, still clinging, but now Fox has his hands free to take the child. "Come on, then."

The kid is tiny, underfed and wraith-like in the way that lots of slave-children are, and Fox realises suddenly that he knows absolutely nothing about what this child has been through. He’ll just do his best. His tiny hands hook easily around Fox’s neck, and he wonders whether Cody has been carrying him. Someone has been; Anakin keeps his knees carefully painless and holds himself up easily.

“General, you are agreeable with this?”

The General smiles wearily. “He will be safe with you and your men I am certain,” he agrees, “keep your shields up, ibli.” He runs his hand lingeringly over Anakin’s head again then brushes a touch over Rex’s before he turns and marches off with Cody at his side towards the Temple.

Ahsoka gets up, and Riyo links their arms together. He watches them leave behind the General, and a tall slender Knight meets them and guides them away. “Let’s go, then,” he sighs, and Anakin nods and rests his head on his shoulder. He strides off the landing pad down to where his transport is stashed, knowing he needs to get someone to drive it back to barracks for him; he can’t take the kids on the speeder.

“Where are we going?”

He cups his hand around Rex’s still-tiny head. “My men live under the Senate. We call it the Den. Most of the others billet under the Temple, where they’re near the Jedi.”

Rex hums, eyes darting all around him at the Jedi Sentinels and the Guard sentries scattered around in their red-swirl paint. His hands are both hooked into his armour, knowing exactly where he can fit his fingers without them being nipped or pressing into Fox’s muscles. Really, it’s rather nice, having his brother-child where he can see him at all times; far better than the anxiety of Cody’s apparently deliberately vague reports.

Git, keeping this secret. Poor kid. “Trooper!”

The trooper snaps a salute. “Commander.”

“I require a transport back to Den.”

“I can take you sir,” the trooper promises, sounding absolutely delighted at the opportunity. Get them in range of a small child, and they’re putty, the whole lot of them, he thinks fondly. “Name’s Rick. For, uh, ricochet.” He keeps sneaking glances at Anakin as he sets up a speeder for them, helmet tipping every time the kid makes any interested noises.

Rex presses into his side, reaching across his back to touch his hand to Anakin’s knee. He remains silent even through Anakin’s excitement, not letting go of either of them at any point. Surely, he must have been warned about Coruscant? But, Fox can remember his first time on Coruscant, the overwhelming colour and noise and sensation of it, so he presses Rex’s head into the curve of his shoulder and strokes at his buzz-curls until Rick pulls up at the entrance closest to the Den. The fewer people the kids have to interact with, they both know, the better.

“Thanks, Rick,” he says gratefully as both boys spill onto the platform.

Rick tips his helmet, chest puffing up in pride. “It is my honour, Commander.”

As the speeder whips back into the traffic, he scoops Anakin up in his right arm and offers Rex his haft hand, who takes it and holds it tighter than he was initially expecting. He squeezes the kid’s hand in comfort.

“Who’s that?” asks Anakin and points at a brother in red-swirled plates, tiny flowering vines tattooed around his hairline. When he cuts it short, it makes a full flower crown.

Fox lifts the child higher against his chest so he can see easier and wave. “That’s Thire.”

Anakin nods, craning his neck to see into the canteen as they pass by. His sun-bleached waves tickle the curve of his jaw and flutter when he sighs. “Who’s in there?”

“Back shift,” he answers, casting sharp eyes at a vod who is certainly not in an acceptable state of dress. “They should be heading out in about half an hour.”

Both boys cling tightly to him, Rex’s small hand tightly clamped in his kama and Anakin’s firmly around his shoulder. “An’ in there?”

“That’s the offices. We run the GAR out of this floor.”

The little boy leans against Fox’s restraining arm in an attempt to see, but the doors are all closed to and Fox has no worry about him seeing in. “Wizard,” he breathes, and he huffs a laugh. It sounds cool until you’re the one who has to do all the sign-offs.

Rex presses against his back, nervous of all the people he doesn’t know, the hustle and noise of it all. The halls are a pale cream, marked by muck and paint and other scratches. It’s all a far cry from the sterile white and greys of Kamino, which must be all that Rex knows. “Fox?”

He hums in response, suddenly realising he has no idea if this are is child-proof. They never bring children back here.

“Just checking,” whispers the kid, and Fox feels his heart crack.

He leads them to his bunk, knowing that his fellow Commanders will just bunk in with some of their brothers. “I’m right here, kid,” promises Fox with a kiss pressed to the top of Rex’s head. He ushers them down the halls, past mostly-empty dorms. There’s little noise this deep into the Den.

It takes him half an hour to find them some replacement clothes; Rex gets given a spare shirt, which hangs off him adorably, but he struggles to find something for Anakin. He tries one of the shirts, and is lost in it. Fox takes a holovideo and sends it straight to Cody, who forwards it to his General, who must send it to the Council because within minutes he has a half-dozen brothers furiously texting. The Shiny who drops off the shirts lingers for over ten minutes, cooing, and Fox resigns himself to spending the next few weeks turning down petitions for adoptions.

It’s going to be hectic. Stone adores small children, even if he pretends he doesn’t.

“Sir? The General is here,” says the same Shiny from earlier, melting at the sight of Anakin in the oversized shirt. “Oh my stars, he’s so tiny.”

Anakin waves and grins, and the Shiny makes a noise like he’s been shot. With a sigh, Fox bodily turns him out of the room. “Thank you, kid,” he says softly, “but you are definitely meant to be sleeping. Goodnight.” The kid’s huge amber eyes are the last thing he sees as he closes the door.

“Thank you so much for watching over them,” General Kenobi says in greeting. He drops heavily, if quietly, into the chair Fox had pulled up for Rex at the side of Anakin’s bunk – Neya’s bunk, but he is on patrol, so the bunk’s free – and leans his elbows on the chair arms. “I know Anakin can be a little bit fractious.”

Fox waves the General’s concerns away as best he can and sits down on his bed, resting his hand on Rex’s knee. Immediately Rex crawls into his lap, mostly-asleep and wrapped in the old thin blanket. “It was fine. We managed to find some old scraps of beskar from an incident a few months ago and put them under his bed, which seems to have lessened the Force input just enough.” Under his hand he feels Rex whimpering at some nightmare. “They’re both struggling.”

“I don’t see how they can do anything but struggle.”

“Where’s Cody?”

The General almost smiles. “The Healers got him. He’s overdue a health check, and he was the one who found the boys. Rex wouldn’t leave his side.”

Fox nods, unsurprised. “They’ve always been very close for not being batchers.”

Without looking up from Anakin’s tanned face, slowly descending into sleep, the General says, “Rex and Cody both think the universe of you.” He places his hand on Anakin’s shoulder an instant before the boy startles himself awake again, big blue eyes glassy in sleep-fears, breath catching. “Sleep, my little one, I’m here. Rex and Fox are here.”

Anakin nods, curls towards his General, closes his eyes but doesn’t start to fall straight back to sleep. He’ll be awake a few minutes at least, if Fox has picked up anything in nights spent with his brothers.

“Rex will sleep through?”

“He might,” agrees Fox, “he always did sleep deeply, but he’ll still wake up fast. Bly is a poor sleeper, and I wake up easily too, so we used to spend a lot of time up with our younger brothers. Older and younger brother is less about age and more about personality for us,” he continues, feeling Rex finally slip into deep sleep from his shivering dream. “Some call me buir, or father, or dad, if they’re under stress.”

The General smiles, even with his eyes, just for a moment. “It’s good that they have such strong bonds.”

Fox, for a minute, considers leaving the conversation there, leaving the peace at the gentle thought of brothers curled into each other and holding hands as they sleep like baby aiwhas, but he can’t. Something plucks in his chest, pushing for him to let the words out, the ones he never says. “Not really. The loss, the grief, the pain. Losing a batcher...” For a moment, he stares down at Rex’s brown face, tucked into his shoulder, the baby-fat still rounding his cheeks and jaw into softer lines. “It will hurt him a great deal, to find out he’s only got Keeli left.”

“When I followed Jango Fett to Geonosis, I wasn’t expecting what happened. It was horrible. We lost 212 of our own, in that one battle. Two hundred and twelve Jedi in what, fifteen minutes? Half an hour?” The General’s face twists up as he speaks. “I lost many dear friends. Family. My crèche-clan is still all alive, for which I will always give thanks, but knowing I may never see them again, may wake up to the loss of them, it hurts deep inside. The Force wailed in grief that day.”

Fox keeps his eyes down at Rex as he muses on that. “A squad is five, normally. But for us it was ten. Our batch-line was fifty, and there were six lines, then I think six more. Some of the Commanders are five months younger than we are. Rex is eleven months younger, the first line of CTs. But out of my ten, only eight of us got out of Geonosis. That isn’t bad, not really, but I lost most of my regiment.”

“I am sorry.”

He looks into the General’s blue-grey eyes. “Stop blaming yourself, sir. It was not your fault.”

The General blinks.

Rex sobs, still asleep, and Fox gladly lets the silence spread between he and the General, a bit concerned about crossing the line, but his vod’ika is whimpering awake from the nightmares and clinging to his neck hard enough to bruise, and that’s distraction enough for now.

“We’re to take them to the Council in the morning,” says the General into the dark, an hour later. About fifteen minutes ago he took off his boots and cloak, now is ticked on the bed with Anakin curled into his side.

He sighs. “I’ll arrange my shifts changed then. I’m sure Thire can handle my morning, I can pull a triple next week sometime to cover it.” If he takes it on active patrol, he’ll maybe even see some action again. Not that he misses it, but they’re designed for bursts of action, not the horrible slog that is Senate duty.

The General looks over at him, those big sad eyes calculating, barely visible in the low light. “How long is a triple shift?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Fox says dryly, and the General huffs but accepts the answer. They’re much the same, Obi-Wan Kenobi and himself: they will work themselves beyond the bone for those they love, and take the weight on their own shoulders for any perceived failure. Silence reigns again.

“Shaak and Plo will want to keep them,” General Kenobi says on a half-laugh. “Anakin is even tinier now than when he came to the Order, and whilst Shaak spends time with your Littles I know Plo won’t have met any.”

Fox breathes a laugh, stroking his hand down Rex’s arm. “I used to do a lot of Littles duty. Colt and I, we used to swap shifts when we could to spend more time there. Nobody ever really held us.” He thinks of their tiny forms against his chest on that last shift before hell-in-white became hell-here, grieves for them all over again. “Anakin is one of the smallest beings I’ve held in months. I got handed a baby a few weeks ago and cried,” he says, and shakes his head.

“Hells,” sighs the General. He nods in agreement.

“Hells.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> um. sorry?


	4. council

Fox dozes off with Rex tucked into his side, the quiet movement of three fellow breathing sentients just enough white noise to cover the gnawing anxiety low in his stomach. In his nightmares – not the Nightmare, not that vision of death and agony they’re all tortured by so often – he sees Rex screaming, is haunted by evil giggles and the high cries of a frightened child; he wakes up startled no less than five times before the shift change before admitting defeat and getting out his datapad. They’re specially adapted, some of them, to have an extremely low light output. It’s made them useful many times in the past, preventing many of their human “supervisors” from nosing in the shift patterns. He won’t have his men put in danger by making it easier for their predators to hunt them down.

“Tap tap,” says Stone lowly from outside, rapping his knuckles on the door. “I’m coming in.” His brother slips into their dorm with a bundle tucked under his arm. “Clothes for the Little. I asked around and one of the girls in the canteen has a brother, so I dropped her home and she gave me these.”

He nods gratefully, slightly distracted by the fact that a Senator has lodged yet another pointless complaint, which means he has to change the shift patterns, again. “Put them on the chair. General, do you require anything?”

The General exhales as he sits up, patting Anakin’s shoulder gently to soothe the kid back into rest. Stone flicks a polite salute in greeting, unravelling the bundle on his bunk. “I always seem to forget just how sensitive you mens’ hearing is,” he admits easily, a little sleepy still. He runs a hand through his fringe. “Just tea, if you would.” Stone nods and slips out again, leaving the door slightly ajar.

“Rex. Wake up,” Fox says, and the kid grunts. His lips quirk before he can stop them – some things haven’t changed at all, and Rex’s unwillingness to leave the comfortable is one of them. “Up and at it, Cadet.”

“M’not a Little, Fox,” protests Rex, pushing himself to his feet as he rubs sleep out of his eyes. The shirt drapes off him, and Fox has to restrain the satisfied purr at seeing his kid cared for. With a low murmur, Anakin wakes up too, sat in the bed drowning in the soft blankets in Barracks. Fox lifts the holopad and takes a photo of them both, saves it to the Command joint server.

He drops a kiss to Rex’s forehead, but just as he opens his mouth to offer breakfast his vambrace comm bleeps, and an alarm sets of wailing down in the comms centre. Immediately all is flurry; Stone races in for his blasters and Fox begins strapping his armour on even as he bellows orders down the hall. “Rex,” he says, turning to him as he straps on his thigh-plates, “I’m trusting you and the General, okay? Get to the Temple quickly. I’ll have someone drop you off.”

“Commander! We have a complication!”

“Harchaak,” he swears, shoving a handful of credits and ration bars in his belt. He wrestles his chestplate on over his head. “Find Cody and do as you’re told by your brothers.” Impulsively he leans down and presses his head to Rex’s, hard, before he tears himself away and sprints down the halls, still tugging his gloves on. He’s not even got his kama strapped on yet.

The communications centre is going a little insane, but he finds Rick easily. “Richochet!”

The Shiny runs over, snapping a smart salute and ignoring that Fox is still tightening his armour. “Yessir.”

“Get the General, Rex, and Anakin to the Temple. I am trusting you, kid,” he warns, and the kid’s eyes widen before determination settles across his face.

“I’ll see it done, Commander,” promises Rick, and he disappears down the hall.

Fox settles his kama before he strides over to the comms desk, leaning over Dadita’s shoulder. “What have we got?”

“Riot in Senate Central, sir,” provides Dadita. He points to one of the cams. “See here, there’s got to be a thousand natties there.”

“Is that the CorSec building?” he asks, narrowing his eyes. If it is that means he has more problems; they were supposed to be raising minimum earnings today but if that fell through he’ll have thousands of infuriated CorSec workers ready to riot at the barest provocation.

Dadita says nothing, and it’s confirmation enough. On the opposite side of the table, Tiptap sighs, fingers flying across the many switches that Fox has no chance of truly understanding.

“Well. I guess we better go in.” He flashes a sign at the nearest Captain, who barks out orders to get riot response on the ground. “I don’t like this. Is there anything else on the cams?”

The cams cycle so fast no nat-born has a chance at taking them all in, but both he and Dadita see what they’re looking for at the same time. A group of maybe thirty sentients, probably half of them non-human, scattered over the roof of the Republica 500. They both know that no matter the number of rats in plain sight, there’s at least their number again hidden, down inside the building.

“Harchaak. Have two response squads at least sent there.”

“And you, Commander?”

An explosion shakes the cams, shorting two or three of them out, near enough that the rattle of it vibrates through the duracrete. “I think that’s my cue,” he growls, and sets of at that ground-eating lope down to the platforms. Squads sprint across the deck, speeders screaming at full throttle through the sky. There’ll be triple shifts after this, he realises, some squads probably already pulling them. He sees one squad land, helmets off, and then worldlessly leap back onto their speeders and whizz after the transport when they realise something has happened. Good men, all of them, such good and selfless men.

“Commander.”

He turns to the Nat-born, a young woman stationed here to finish earning her course credits. Well, he considers, she definitely earns them. He’s written her some extremely positive recommendations. “Report.”

“They’ve blown five cameras, but no reports have come from Rep500. The Senate is in session and more troops are being assigned to provide additional security. You have one message from the, uh, from an Ordo?”

Kark, he thinks, the damn things overlap. “Hit me.”

“Meeting tomorrow, co-ords set to your private.”

He sighs – this means the Commandos have a job and want to pick his brains. “Well, message that number back and tell him that Commander Fox says to look at the news and stop bothering his people.” Grief, his usual driver, whistles shrilly from the landing pad. “I’m going to this explosion site.”

“Yessir,” she says, and he spares her a pat on the shoulder before jogging away.

Grief grunts in greeting. “Commander.”

“I swear to the kriffing stars I am going to commit a treason,” he hisses, and Grief laughs. They have this exchange every day without fail. Grief is a good soldier, knows their limits, and has some of the fastest driving times in the whole of the Senate-based Guard.

Smoke rises in a dark plume. Half-way between the Temple and the Senate; he flags an amber alert to all units on Coruscant, which he knows now includes the Temple Guardians. “Well kriff,” observes Grief, sounding a bit impressed.

Fox wonders, as he does every time he flies out over his cesspit of a planet, whether this is even worth it. “Let’s get this over with, I have a Council appointment.”

“Landing now.”

The rubble isn’t the worst he’s seen, but most people know better than to blow stuff up on Coruscant. A small crowd has gathered, stunned and quiet. He knows this noise too well.

“It’s the Commander,” says one man, with an exhale that sounds like relief. “The Guard are here.”

He crouches to get a view of the rubble patterns, ignoring the many processes flicking over the scene; he’s long since learned to let his helmetcam do its job whilst looking with his own eyes. “Does anyone know what happened?” he asks, standing. The same man from before shrugs helplessly, and Fox hums. Rex and Anakin are waiting for him.

“Hand over the scene, sir?”

For a moment he considers it, rolling timing and duties over and over, before making his decision fast enough most of these Nat-borns wouldn’t know he’s even hesitated. “Handover to the Captain. Transferring responsibility. Grief, get me to the Temple.”

They nod sharply. “Immediately, sir.”

They’re both silent all the way to the Temple: Fox wouldn’t say he was stewing, but his nightmares are now overridden by the much more pressing tangle of chaos that met him not more than a standard hour ago. Does this explosion have a link to the rabble who are on the Rep500? Is this linked to the riots? Not only do Anakin and Rex still need to fix whatever happened to them, but he needs to talk to Cody about why keeping information is really not a good thing, and then at some point before night-shift he needs to sit with Rex and break the news about Ip and Seven. Then he’ll have to try and get in touch with Keeli, who isn’t answering his comm. Maybe he’s just bunked down somewhere.

Fox really hopes Keeli is just bunked in somewhere.

“Shall I wait, sir?”

“No, Grief,” he answers as he jumps out. “Go do as needs done.”

“Sir,” nods Grief, then they peel rapidly into traffic, and Fox is left on the edge of the landing pad in the crisp High Coruscanti air, with the Temple behind him and the smoke rising up from his planet between him and the Senate.

He inhales slowly. Rest not on these timeless things, he scolds himself. Duty is awaiting. Some of the Temple Guards nod at him, but he doesn’t have time to exchange greetings today. The route to the Council Chamber is one he knows well enough by now – there are a remarkable number of Jedi-Guard meetings involved in the day-to-day running of the War, even if he doesn’t have a General.

Half-way up the winding staircase he almost literally into Shadow Vos. “Oh, it’s you,” he says before his brain-mouth filter catches up and he cringes under his helmet. Familiarity in the field is one thing, but in the Jedi’s own home it is most certainly a few levels too irreverent.

Vos laughs. “Indeed. Come on, then, I’m headed up to the Chambers myself.” He jogs up the staircase level with Fox, hair twisted up in a rather elegant bun secured by what looks like a Pencil. Fox mentally retracts the word elegance. “Obi and the kids are waiting for us. I’ve told him you’re here.”

“How?”

Vos winks. “Mental link, mate. Very useful over short distances.”

He can see why such a thing would be useful; it would negate the need to stay in sight or rely on having better hearing than their targets. Perhaps he should see whether any of his brothers are capable of transmitting thought – a couple of the young ones are allegedly Force Sensitives. The Council Chamber doors are open, and he can hear high giggles from within. Children – yes, the Jedi are very loving with their Littles, he remembers. It’s rather a shame he personally never gets chance to go creche duty.

“Oh I’m going to enjoy this,” breathes Vos, and before Fox has time to protest that this is entirely irregular the Jedi has rushed within. “Where is my favourite nephew!”

General Kenobi sighs, head resting on one hand. “He is your only nephew.”

“And hence,” says Vos, spreading his arms with an ‘innocent’ grin, “my favourite.”

Anakin, sat on General Kenobi’s lap in his council chair with Rex sat on a cushion at their feet, giggles. “I’m Anakin!”

“How very tiny you are now, kidlet,” exclaims Vos in mock amazement. Rex shifts, a bit discomforted by all the noise; he’s probably not used to all the sensory input yet. When Fox offers his hand, he comes over quickly, hooking his fingers into his plates again with a low hum. “Shall I take him?”

Grandmaster Yoda hums. “Stay, you will, as long as quiet, you are.” He looks to Fox and Rex. “Sit on the cushions you should if tired you are. Alerts, you sent out. Problems, there are?”

“Only as many as usual,” he answers, and Rex looks up at him curiously. He cups the back of Rex’s head in his palm. “We shall not be disturbed unless my presence is absolutely required.” He moves to the cushion Rex was sat on and settles Rex on his lap. Rex tucks his head into his neck, cradling his helmet in his lap.

The Grandmaster hums, and the atmosphere weightens. It is time to get on with the meeting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This should have been the full Council meeting chapter, but the CG deserve their times to be badasses. I love them.


	5. discussion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Madame Nu may be the most beautiful being Rex has ever met.

“A strange situation this is,” observes Grandmaster Yoda. His ears lift a little, and Rex finds himself staring in fascination. He’s seen a lot, this last few weeks, but the Jedi Grandmaster is one of the strangest. “Most strange indeed. Any understanding of this matter have we gained?”

Rex and Fox listen intently as the Master Jedi share a few theories or important sounding snippets of information; none of this is new to Rex, and he hears a few things that strike him as unusual, but nothing that really adds to his understanding of the situation. He feels like he doesn’t really understand anything, but his older brother is here, and nothing can kill one of First Batch, so he’s safe in Fox’s hold. After all, they have all these Jedi too, and Jedi protect those in their care.

“Are their ages important?” asks one of the Lady Jedi, a Togruta with beautiful long lekku. He thinks she looks kind, and serene. He half wishes she wasn’t just a holo, so he could see her properly.

General Kenobi sighs heavily. “Anakin is seven. Rex, you’re fourteen, right?”

“So they’re both seven,” says Fox in surprise, hand stilling where he’d been stroking down Rex’s arm, “what’s so important about seven?”

With a sigh General Windu, the one who looks so angry but who had smiled and gruffly offered to let Rex sit in his seat, rubs his brow. “Quite a lot, it seems. Our counting process is base seven, and several Order traditions are seven-year relevant. I will admit, I had forgotten to allow for the accelerated aging influencing this. If Rex were to be a physical seven-year-old, he would be three and a half?”

Fox nods. “Still a Little, yes. Barely into basic training.”

There is the sensation of a flinch, though none of the Jedi move a great deal – their Littles don’t start weapon-training until they’re Anakin’s age, General Kenobi had told them whilst they were in the sparring rooms on the Negotiator. Grandmaster Yoda taps his stick on the floor. “Guilt, this is no time for. Know we did not. Know we do now. What we do with this information, important that it. Forwards, we go.”

“Haj Dai,” mutter the collected Jedi in unison, much how the Command batches had used ‘stay alive’ at the end of the meeting he’d talked to Fox in. Fox glances at Anakin, who is peering up at General Kenobi in awe, and when he looks down again Rex shrugs. He doesn’t know what it means either, but he’s heard it a few times.

Anakin’s ‘uncle’ speaks next. “Do we know what caused this?” He walks in slow circles in the centre of the room, tipping his head this way and that as he thinks. Rex thinks he is nothing like General Kenobi – but they call each other brother, so they must be similar some ways, like how Rex and Keeli aren’t very alike. Although, maybe what the clones consider to be different isn’t what nat-borns do. “I can’t sense much from either of them, even Anakin.”

“Do you think you could use your psychometry for it, Shadow Vos?”

Shadow Vos considers Master Windu’s question and Rex mouths the name to himself a few times so he remembers it. “No, I doubt it.”

Everyone is quiet for a few moments, until General Kenobi’s fingers start up a slow tap. It sounds a bit like the tapping code Command use, the dadita. A Mandalorian tap-code they learned off the Alphas who learned it off the Prime. “Master Nu may know.”

“If anyone will it would be her or Tholme I think,” agrees Vos, pausing attack-still. “He’s away, so Madame Nu is our best choice.”

The two men share a look heavy with things unsaid, but Rex has no idea what those things are. Maybe Fox does, he thinks; Fox must know everything now. “See to it, Quin.”

Vos’ lip twitches. “Gleefully,” he drawls, and with a final irreverent salute to the Council at large he strides purposefully out of the room, robes flowing behind him in ways that a kama just doesn’t.

Grandmaster Yoda laughs. “Changed, neither of you.”

“Oh, I think we may have settled down a little,” insists General Kenobi, and is met with sceptical noises from everyone in the room. He raises an eyebrow, grins. “I did say a little.”

Anakin giggles. “Cody said you’re a bad influence.”

“I am an excellent influence,” responds the General in mock insult, and Rex snorts loud enough that the gathered Jedi hear. He freezes stock-still, blue eyes terror-wide – what if he isn’t allowed to be so familiar? Cody had been there, and General Kenobi was so kind on the ship, but this isn’t the ship and there’s more Jedi than just Padawan Ahsoka and the General now. Fox stiffens imperceptibly with him, hands tight around Rex’s wrists, but the General laughs loudly, honestly. “Well. Perhaps not excellent.”

Cautiously, they relax. It wouldn’t do for them to be seen as interfering, as disrespectful, but Rex’s little misdemeanour seems to be considered unimportant, which is a relief; he really doesn’t want to be decommissioned. The Jedi are so...nice.

“Sith artefacts?”

Windu tips his head. “I have never encountered such a thing as this. Master?”

“Age regression, I know not. Tangled the Force is; meditate, Skywalker and Kenobi should, when opportunities they have. Shields, young Skywalker needs, hm? Create a Temple where I would build a fence, he can.” The old Master burbles again, amused by some quip or other, but it doesn’t last. Those old sad eyes turn again to Rex. “Remember anything further do you?”

He shakes his head, pressing back into Fox. “I woke up in the rocks in my blacks, and there was armour there too but I didn’t recognise it, and there was Anakin too. Anakin had a feeling and followed it, which was the Force right?”

The Jedi Grandmaster nods kindly, indicating he should continue.

“So we followed it and found the Negotiator,” he continues, racking his brain for anything else. It’s mostly a blur of tears and exhaustion. For something to focus on, Rex starts tracking the movements of Fox’s fingers across the datapad, lines and lines and lines of text Rex doesn’t know the context of flying by almost too quickly to see.

The General reaches down to touch his shoulder. “Thank you, Rex. I know this isn’t easy.” He sits back up, but Anakin slides down to perch on his leg. Fox sighs and shifts them until Rex sat between his brother’s legs – and how much higher his knees are now than he remembers them being – and Anakin sat on Rex.

The doors swing open to reveal Vos and a tall, elderly Human woman with grey hair held up with long wooden pins, like the ones Tup keeps in his special box and only wears on special occasions. There is a knowing to her gaze, a weight to her, which is astounding: he has never seen anyone as old as these Jedi, and she is – a miracle. She bows before she speaks. “I hear you have questions I may be able to answer.”

Vos wanders over and sits on General Kenobi’s chair arm, ruffling Anakin’s hair as he does. At his back, Fox huffs, almost a sound of amusement.

“Indeed we do, Archivist Nu.”

She grins. “Just call me Jocasta.” Her old eyes turn to them, amused, and he supposes it is a little funny, two Jedi, a Commander, a Cadet and a Jedi Little. “And you must be Rex. Commander Fox, a pleasure as always.”

Fox clacks his chestplate in salute. “Master Nu, likewise. Forgive me if I don’t get up,” he says in his posh accent that sounds like General Obi-Wan’s only angrier.

“Of course, Commander. Now then, Shadow Vos informs me there is nothing to be learned by psychometry, so I intend to examine your Force Signatures, ibli.”

Rex leans in to whisper that ibli means little, or little one, because he’s reasonably sure Fox doesn’t know, but it doesn’t matter whether he does. There is very little Rex understands right now, but he’s been picking up General Obi-Wan’s Jedi-language over the last few weeks, and this is now a thing he does know.

“You’re a pathetic lifeform, Quin,” drawls the General in quiet affection, low enough that most of the other Jedi might not hear, although Rex hasn’t done much in the way of species identification yet so maybe they do. It might be one of their Jedi abilities.

“Oh, I’m the pathetic one today am I?” Vos leans sideways until he’s sprawled with a complete lack of dignity across his brother-Jedi. “Nice to know. But remember I am your pathetic lifeform. We’ve been stuck together this long.”

“Don’t you have a job to do?” asks General Kenobi normal-voice, sharp but affectionate, through Shadow Vos’ hand smushed into his face.

“Nope. I intend to use my day off to bother you and corrupt Anakin as much as I can and establish myself as the best uncle.” He winks down at Rex and Anakin, and they giggle quietly as Fox sighs heavily if silently.

Master Nu glares at them both, and they subside, curled on the council chair like a pair of loth-kittens like Tup had showed him on the holonet. She raises her eyebrow, and Vos smiles as innocently as he can manage, which is nothing near as innocent as General Obi-Wan manages. Against his back, Fox’s chest heaves yet again.

“If attention, you could pay, then progress, we could make,” rumbles Grandmaster Yoda. “Meditate we will,” instructs the ancient muppet, and the gathered Jedi all close their eyes. He feels it, the pressure of the Force humming around them. 

Master Nu drapes herself onto the floor in the centre of the room, elegant robes twitched into pleasing lines. Up on the chair is a flurry of movement, and Anakin peeks up at them and grins as bright as any star. He tucks under Rex’s chin, and his oldest brother wraps them both in one unbreakable arm secure and steadfast, like an aiwha swooping through a storm. The Jedi all close their eyes, and Anakin does too, a curious awe spreading over his face.

“Their meditation,” Fox whispers against his ear, “watch them.”

It feels like rainwater, he thinks, like that extra layer feeling of being soaked through and hard-worked by one of the trainers and their incessant cruelty. Maybe it feels like heat does, not that he really has much experience of it. Drowsy, tired out all the way through himself, Rex lets himself lean into Fox full-weight, trusting wordlessly that his brother would hold him and protect him.

If what Anakin felt when they awoke was anything like this safety, then Rex understands why he would have followed it. His brother hums under his breath, the vibration travelling though his breastplate into Rex, and it feels like being home.

Eventually, after exactly nineteen minutes, Master Nu exhales noisily, her eyebrows quirking. Without opening her eyes she begins to speak. “I have seen many things in my life, and many have made a great impact on me. However, the traces I sense in young Anakin and Rex are a type of magick, unlike that of the Dathomiri Nightsisters; closer to the old Jedaii.” Her eyes open, a thoughtful quirk of her lips making Rex wonder whether she was this beautiful as a younger woman. There is so much beauty in age, he thinks. “I don’t know much about it, but I can certainly tell you who does.”

General Obi-Wan and Vos both go very still, and Anakin peers up at them uncertainly. As though he suddenly feels the weight of the planet, Grandmaster Yoda sighs. “My concern, this was,” he says quietly, introspectively.

Master Nu’s whole face does a thing that reminds Rex of what the Alphas would do when they’d predicted a team’s result and been disappointed by being right. “Well,” she says with no brightness whatsoever and a glance skywards, “I suppose if anyone was going to know anything about this, it would be him.”

“Who?” asks Fox on behalf of the three non-Jedi on the floor.

She bares her teeth. “Count Dooku.”


End file.
